


On a High Horse

by ShiHeTsu



Series: In Our Dreams [2]
Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Character Death In Dream, M/M, Wheelchairs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:00:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25252765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShiHeTsu/pseuds/ShiHeTsu
Summary: “So what do you want to know?” Izaya asked when a stillness started to creep him out to a point of a slowly building nauseous feeling in a pit of his stomach.“You” Shizuo let his hand with the lighter fall over his knee. “Just you, flea” he added but that only resulted in a shiver running down brunette’s back that he easily noted. “Do you know where you are, Izaya?”
Relationships: Heiwajima Shizuo/Orihara Izaya
Series: In Our Dreams [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1829506
Comments: 2
Kudos: 34





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Theme song: What Kind Of Man - Florence + The Machine

„So this is your life now?” Shizuo looked around a living room.

The place was not as extravagant as Izaya’s apartment in Shinjuku. This one was in outskirts of the city. The furniture was not as dark and with more accessories making it more cozy. Beige was a color that took over in it, making it brighter. There was no desk that could remind for some of a throne and instead of was of books there were few low bookcases. And Shizuo could see their practical side. On opposite side of a couch, right behind a wooden coffee table, there was sitting an owner of this place. But no additional armchair has been placed there. Orihara Izaya was sitting in a wheelchair facing the blond. His auburn eyes fixed on a wooden surface of a table. 

Shizuo turned his back to the man who used to be one of few feared in Ikebukuro. He ran his fingers over spine covers, loudly skipping from on to the next one. Shizuo was briefly reading and pronouncing loudly in his head each title. Psychology, behaviorism, persuasion were words on most of them. What stood out was a title that would help a new owner of a dog. He picked that one and flipped through pages that were marked with sticker notes picking from sides. Phrases like “don’t show you’re afraid”, “give enough exercise”, “read every move”, “have upper hand” were written down on bright yellow papers. For a long moment there was nothing besides the overwhelming silence that was surrounding two of them. 

“You’ve came to finish the job?” Izaya cut the calm. 

Shizuo turned his neck to pick at the still man in the wheelchair. He looked back and ran tip of his fingers over impeccable handwriting. With a sigh he closed it with a snap and made his way to a couch. Loudly he throw the book on a coffee table that made Izaya flinch. He throw himself on a cushion throwing his arms on a backrest. He stared at the dark haired man who still haven’t crossed their eyes. Izaya let his eyelids fall after spotting the book of Shizuo’s choosing. The blond clenched his fist, flexing his fingers as if testing always present pressure under his skin. Everything was so real here.

_Shizuo grabbed at Shinra’s arm feeling that whatever strength in his muscles has been left after two years of comatose state still made a illegal doctor flinch. Still not able to stand properly on his two legs so for due time he was following Shinra’s orders to stay in bed. His shirt more like a long tunic, white and with blue spots made him feel like in a real hospital room. A white curtain separating him from another bedmate only amplified the feeling. The other patient that merely few hours previously was a center of a chaos that greeted Shizuo after his awakening. Most of the commotion forgotten thanks to quick change of places and Shinra plugging a syringe to a PVC with something that knocked him out to use Celty’s helpful hand._

_“Send me back” the blond spite into Shinra’s face after pushing him to his level._

_“No way!” the doctor pushed back taking advantage to weakened state of his friend. “You can’t be serious! We barely managed to bring you back!” he stepped aside out of reach. Shizuo leaned on a railing on a side of his bed trying to catch at retreating man. He stayed there, hanging on a metal pipe staring at Shinra with his trademark scowl._

_He looked at the curtain that was separating him from soothing he tried to catch for most of his life._

“I can see I had done a quite good job” Shizuo murmured and at his words Izaya finally looked up with wide eyes. Shizuo pushed himself from the backrest and leaned forward digging elbows into his tights. “I came here to get information” he stated.

Izaya reached for the book that slide to his side of the table. He picked it up and placed on his lap covering with his arms as if trying to hide the title. “I don’t do that anymore” he admitted as hoping that it would cut a visit short.

“Well, there is no one else who will have answers to that, so you have to do” he reached to a pocket of his trousers and picked out a box of cigarettes and a lighter. 

He flipped a base lid of his metal branded lighter. He could see that Izaya was nearly stopping him from lighting end of cigaret after seeing a silent remark on barely opened lips. For a second he has been still observing the other man. But seeing the brunette lowering his eyes in a silent agreement he once again fumbled with a flint wheel. Out of habit he put his hand on a side as if covering a flicker flame from a wind. He flipped a metal back, extinguish the flame and looked at a small engraved letter. “Stay strong KH” had been placed by his brother and given to Shizuo on his birthday.

“How do you know I had a lighter from Kasuka?” Shizuo asked turning it to Izaya who only shrugged and kept on running his russet eyes all over the glass coffee-table. For a long moment there was nothing but silence finally disturbed by a hum of a fridge in attached kitchen.

“So what do you want to know?” Izaya asked when a stillness started to creep him out to a point of a slowly building nauseous feeling in a pit of his stomach. 

“You” Shizuo let his hand with the lighter fall over his knee. “Just you, flea” he added but that only resulted in a shiver running down brunette’s back that he easily noted. “Do you know where you are, Izaya?”

The informant frowned and looked at a window on his right. He looked over blurred landscape and took it in detecting all known spots and buildings. The same bright bright residential block on the other side of a narrow street filled with balconies in rectangle shapes. And he was sure that at its bottom were few shops- one with sushi that not as extravagant as Russia Sushi has been a nice reminder of his old life. The building itself wasn’t an obstacle to not spot another roofs of smaller ones that were a floor of concrete for miles. Izaya’s apartment hasn’t been the best flashy place he had been used to but it has its charms and improvements like a wide elevator that could fit his wheelchair and additional passenger without inconvenience to other residents.

Shizuo observed the confused man. He knew how your own mind could trick you into believing in a reality of that devilious medicine that had been pumped into his own body. Even now he wasn’t sure if all that surrounded him wasn’t real. The softness of cushion under him, bitterness of the cigarette smoldering between his fingers, a dust dancing in the air illuminated by a warm rays of sunshine coming out of the same window that took Izaya’s full attention. All felt so real but now being aware of it, he could see few details. Like a foggy-like view from the window that lacked details in windows of the building on the opposite side. The bookcase he had been standing before was just plainly brown without any patterns of a wood. The ash on his cigarette has been falling and landing on a carpet without any trace. Izaya’s imagination was good, really realistic but not that good. For sure more realistic than Shizuo’s.

When Shizuo woke up, if that could be called that way, he was in a center of his own coronation. The desire of being in charge of things while sleeping had probably done that for him. The self hatred he had felt that had been consuming his insides placed him in a center of a chaos that with each opponent to his rule has been confirming that he had been an unstoppable monster. That he was unstoppable monster. The tranquility that had supposed to be given to him while detached from a real world has been long forgotten. And so with each passing day, week, month, year the poison has spread in his mind. Noone there to blame for his own vicious side. 

Because till his final fight with Izaya he had always someone to blame for his temper. Random thugs, gangs, debtors, strangers… Izaya. The man took more blame than most. Because even if they had been a brief nudge the one that had cause the chaos has been Shizuo himself ad he couldn’t hide from it anymore. It was his own hands, his own tempter that treated all around him. Izaya was only the one that called on his bullshit the most though not without his own pleasure in it for sure. Maybe in this weird surreal world he would find out why. Maybe here he would find an answer to a question that had pushed him to Kishitani Shingen clutches in the first place. _Izaya, why?_

And at the end he needed to find a way to bring Izaya back.

_“Fucking why!” Shizuo pulled at Shinra’s lab coat bringing him closer and spiting at the specky’s face. “Why the hell it will not work the same way with the flea?” he added demanding an answer._

_“There are too many unknown!’ Shinra pushed back and flipped his too long hair out of his glasses. “We DO know that he has been stuck somewhere between your conscious and his own. I have no idea how that happened! No one even tried to merge two consciousness together and ripping the main one out!” he stopped there and with heavy breath kept staring at Shizuo’s scowling face. “That’s probably why my father was so excited about the whole thing” he added more quietly._

_With a huff he fall down on a chair right beside Shizuo’s bed. All strength that had been keeping him for past few hours left his body. For past early morning he was fighting to keep Izaya in a catatonic state for it to finally slip into a comatose. Medically induced coma has been the only thing Shinra could have done after Izaya’s heart failed him numerous times. He kept Izaya in that state for a week and slowly lower a dosage of medication to finally wake him up. But he didn’t!_

_He could feel looming curtains behind his back. It was him that has talked Izaya into this and he couldn’t even bring him back. He didn’t dare to look behind._

_“I’m not sure he would survive another cardiac arrest” Shinra murmorred more to himself than Shizuo but he was sure that with a silence in the room the blonde could hear him just fine. He once again could feel a strong grip on his arm. He looked up at Shizuo still hanging on a metal railing._

_“Send me back” Shizuo said with all seriousness creeping on his soul. “Let me fucking go” he added only putting more pressure._

_“Well” Shinra started with a shrug. “He won’t survive like that anyway” he brushed Shizuo’s clenched fist that surprisingly left his arm. “The brain activity shows that it… slowly shuts down” he flinched at that._

_[No, you can’t!] Celty showed up out of nowhere with her screen nearly pushed into Shizuo’s face making him lean back on a pillow at his back._

_“Like fuck I can’t!” he roared. “This whole thing started BECAUSE of Izaya in the first place!” he pushed a PDA away using as little strength as he could but with his frail muscles it turned out he needed to increase power in them to move stable stans he had._

_[And you’ll let his sacrifice go to waste?!] She showed after a second of tapping at the screen._

_“I won’t let him die a second time!” Shizuo roared._

_[He has never been dead!] her outstretched hand trembled with all emotions._

_She couldn’t figure out why Shizuo would throw himself into the same nightmare, literally, to save the man. She was grateful for Izaya’s help but between two of them she would choose Shizuo to be well and alive rather than Izaya. And that didn’t sit well with her. Her attachment made her feel human emotions that deep down she knew she shouldn’t feel. But still…_

_Her neck bent with helmet falling in shame. With her 360 degree view she saw Shizuo’s starved hollow face. No amount of food he consumed for the past week gave the old healthy complexion he used to have. And something she could only describe as her heart squeezed for her dear friend. At the beginning what connected them was their alienation to the humanity around them only to give each other support and bond over slowly discovered humanity in them. Something was telling her, whispering ominously in her non existing ear, that it will be the last time she would see his determined light brown eyes._

_[You’ll die] she weakly lifted her PDA as if whispering her pain to him. The words keep hanging between them for Shizuo to finally put his hand and lowering it to her side._

_“No, I won’t” he said softly and his face twisting in a crooked smile. “Who the fuck you think I am?” he added with a cocky remark._

_His words didn’t make her feel better. But with his mind set he turned to Shinra once again._

_“Okay, so…” he stretched a unsaid question for a second to finally say it out loud. “What I need to look for?”_

_Shinra studied Shizuo’s face for a few moments._

_“I don’t know.”_

  
  


“Osaka” Izaya’s voice pulled Shizuo from his last encounter with Shinra and Celty.

The blonde looked out the window. _Ah, Osaka_ … So that was the city Izaya has been hiding for all this time. And it seemed that he was still hiding. He leaned on a backrest crossing his eyes with the brunette. 

“Where you really are, Izaya?” he forced a question once again on the man. He saw a confusion written all over slim face who took a same stance as him and leaned on a leather of his chair.

“I don’t understand” he admitted with a frown. “You came here, you should know where we are.”

“I know where we are. But do you?” Shizuo said and all of it was like enigma to Izaya. “Why here?”

Izaya confusion was making him tired already. This whole new composued pesona of Shizuo was tiresome to say the least. Izaya didn’t like a feeling of being put into a game while still not knowing rules of it. In short, he didn’t like this new side of the brute. But still he was happy to see him here without any murderous intentions. And the feeling of something left to tell the man. He had no idea how much time has passed since the last time they’d seen each other on the streets of Ikebukuro. And the opportunity of having an actual conversation with the blonde without any threats was feeling him with something bright and fragile that he slowly started to fear. Hope was something that could crush a man.

“I don’t know” he admitted and crossed arms on his chest uncovering an offensive title. “I wanted to be as far from Ikebukuro as I could. An acquaintance of mine set me up with an apartment and clean tab to rest after hospitalization” he emphasized on the last part searching for any reaction from the blonde. 

“Don’t put that shit only on me, flea” he gruffed and throw a rest of a cigarette in an ashtray that happened to be there. He squeezed a lighter into his breast pocket letting it ground him. “Why you tried to kill me?”

“I don’t know!” Izaya throw himself nearly tripping his wheelchair in a process. He slammed at a armrest of his chair with open palm. 

“Yes, you know” Shizuo leaned too entwining fingers of his hands like to a prayer and let them hang on his wide spread knees. “Why did you try to kill me?”

“I said, I don’t know. And what is that?” he spite. “Are you five to ask so many annoying questions?!” Izaya didn’t like where this conversation was throwing him. The nervousness only increased with each second of Shizuo’s rational thinking. He needed to turn the tables and fast.

“Oh no” Shizuo hissed glaring at the brunette. “You won’t make me facking angry only to run away once again.”

“As a matter of fact, I cannot run!” he added rushing on a feeling of slowly being trapped. 

“Yes, you can” Shizuo looked around the apartment once again admiring the details of Izaya’s imagination. “You can do whatever you can, in here.”

“Like hell I can” a curse throw Shizuo off.

For a few seconds they were staring at each other only for Shizuo to stand up. While not trying to scare the other man he kept to his side of a table giving a metal, wood and glass as a form of shield to the brunette. 

“Come on” Shizuo throw his hand in the direction of a chair. “Stand up” but there was no reaction from the crippled man. “Izaya, stand the fuck up” he said dangerously.

“Are you crazy? There’s no wa…” the words died in Izaya’s throat when Shizuo moved and slowly passed his side of a long table. “What do you think you’re doing?!” Izaya asked alarmed and tried to lose a break on a side of his wheelchair. It was stuck or his fumblings were so panicked that he couldn’t make a clutch to move. The desperate “Don’t come near me!” has been thrown the blond’s way.

No amount of struggling was helping Izaya with putting a distance between two of them. The wheelchair would not move with a metal brake stuck. Shizuo kept on passing the distance and Izaya could almost see a shadow of consequence right behind blond’s back looming over them. He stayed in Osaka and swear to never come back to Ikebukuro to avoid the man that was slowly approaching him. He believed that they would never need to have this conversation. That cleaning the air between them would give him an absolution that he had though was out of his reach. That all those years he let to die under a weight of a last vending machine thrown his way would raise hunting him once again. The first found joy of seeing the man after such a long time now turning into a terror of baring his soul.

Long legs have been eating the distance away in a tempo that Izaya wasn’t ready for. The long forgotten habit of a dodge stirred his move into a motion. Muscles of his legs twitched and with a firm grip on an armrest he pushed himself from his wheelchair and he throw it right under Shizuo’s feet to give the other one more obstacle that could give Izaya an advantage and way to escape. But that was the moment when he his eyes widened while staring at a blanket usually placed over his lap, pooling over his own feet. Heavy breaths attacked his chest squeezing it in a panic that hit him. He was standing on his own legs without any pain in his back. With his eyes stuck on a cloth with a tartan pattern of green and red. According to doctors he shouldn’t be able to move as freely after a strain on his legs after colliding with a part from a construction site. And his adrenaline fueled body pushed itself to its limits only causing more damage on nerves at his spine.

He didn’t catch Shizuo stepping over the fallen wheelchair. The blonde put his hands on both Izaya’s shoulders and lower himself to level his face with a shorted man. He took a long breath through his nose as if breathing in a calming air with a hint of Izaya’s desperation. Only then the retired informant looked up with his mouth frozen on a choked surprise.

“Izaya” Shizuo said the name softly for a first time in his life. He new that it was not an answer the other man was looking for but for him- it was. Everything started with him on a school field and would end with him as well.

“H-how?” he asked weakly. Shizuo frowned, the man shouldn’t be so fragile- never. His strength was supposed to match Shizuo’s.

“Izaya” once again he let the name slide smoothly. “It’s not real. All of it” he looked around the room. “It’s not real” he looked into frightened eyes. “Do you remember what happened?”

Izaya lowered his eyes, staring at a space between them with a frown going over recent events. He remembered their final fight. He remembered Kine in a car and Izaya’s request to be taken away from the city. He remembered weeks in the hospital in Osaka in his private, paid room. His weeks filled with boredom and pain. But nothing after that. The doctors faces were empty and gray. No nametags, no change of shifts in a hospital. He just knew he was there. He needed to be! If not, how he would end up in a wheelchair with information about his condition. For passed weeks he was here, in this apartment, not leaving it even once but he still knew that there was a sushi shop at the bottom of a nearby building. The neighbors names without knowing their faces. That a recycled trash was taken each mondays and unsorted waste on wednesdays. He knew it! He knew it all!

“N-no” he said finally looking up to stare at brown eyes that were still as a mud.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Theme song: Without You (Extended) · Ursine Vulpine & Annaca

Shizuo turned on a faucet and water rushed out only to define a gravity and instead of pouring down to a drain it moved up to a kitchen ceiling. A puddle formed on a white surface hovering above his head. He kept staring at a crystal clear liquid gathering above him. Whatever was happening in Izaya’s head it was messing with a reality of his dream.

_“How long do we have?” Shizuo asked while helping Shinra to pierce a needle through his thick skin. The doctor straighten a cord checking if it wasn’t bend and stuck somewhere._

_“I don’t know” Shinra said not daring to look up._

They didn’t have time. Shizuo knew that there was not enough time for Izaya to go over a shock that struck him. Shizuo knew that he once again needed to use his brutal insensitivity to pull the man out of a space zone. He looked at a tall glass in his hand and turned it upside down filling it up. He turned water off and without second glance at a puddle above him he moved to a couch where Izaya kept staring at a fallen wheelchair. Shizuo pushed a glass in front of his face stirring him from a daze. Izaya first looked at the glass then at Shizuo only to look once again lower to offered drink. 

“There was no one here” Izaya finally said after taking a sip. “No one came here. Nobody on a street” he stated leaning on his working legs and placing side of a glass to a crook of his neck ro cool himself down. “Where are we?” he asked looking up at Shizuo.

The man sighed and sit back on a coffee table right in front of Izaya that turned out to be more stable that he had first thought. He lowered his gaze to joined hands in front of him being aware of a short distance between them. With a thumb he kept on picking at a line of an old scar on his point finger. He was astonished how well his body has been recreated in this dream reality. Every detail of it. Was it his own doing or Izaya’s observations reflected on a flesh he was occupying at the moment. The later gave him a warm fuzzy feeling somewhere at the bottom of his stomach. Something akin to a happiness started to bubble in his chest. The trivial feeling in a situation like that, a selfish feeling he shouldn’t have. He looked up and caught russet orbs looking at him with expectation for answers. He had none, lost himself in a mission with an unknown goal.

“In your head” Shizuo finally said trying to figure out himself if that was a correct answer. It seemed right. That was Izaya’s dream. And if not a dream at least a reality constructed by him.

“So you’re not real?” he asked squinting his eyes with a wariness.

“No, I’m real” he pushed his joined hands to his lips gnawing at his lower lip behind them. The nervous habit helped him with blurring words out and letting place them in order. “Shinra send me” he finally said after pulling his hands away aware that his lip must be reddened by picking at a chapped scrap. “The same way he’d done for you. ”

“I was in someone’s head?” he asked taken aback by a comment.

“Yeah. Mine. You brought me back. Izaya, I’m...” he stopped lowering his head and looking at a tan skin of his hands. “I’m sorry. Shinra… He couldn’t pull you out.”

“Why?” Izaya asked and a confused expression fell leaving his face blank. “Am I dying?” he asked flatly.

Shizuo pushed his hands into his hair picking at dried from a bleach mane. Izaya stating the matter was the first time that it hit him in what grave danger was the man in front of him. It never supposed to come to this. Shizuo in his guilt trip let himself to be a guinea pig for Shinra’s father to get few weeks of a pain free time to turn from grieving. To leave all the gnawing emotions that tried to consume his days and nights. Of the whole consuming sound of cracking bones and blood seeping past Izaya’s thin lips. Of reality without something that was a constant in his life. Of a chaos that hadn’t left even without a main player in it. Izaya was not a reason for all the pain and destruction to leave him. He was a force of redirecting all of Shizuo’s ruin and pinpoint on a lean body that had kept out of Shizuo’s doomed hands. And whatever sentiment and excitement had been a part of his miserably life it left with him. Shizuo hasn’t been peaceful, not even for a day. Their long gone chase has been replaced by a shorter temper and more random victims. He was a beast that without a leash and a tug on it was biting everyone around. He should be put down like a rabid dog.

Shizuo run his hands over his face trying to flat lines of a frown. He pushed them with a long exhale and looked up at the brunette. “We need to find a way to get you out of here.”

“You haven’t answered” Izaya said flatly leaning on a backrest holding a glass with both hands and placing it between his legs. “I’m dying, am I?” that sounded more like a statement rather a question that needed to be confirmed or denied.

“You’re not!” Shizuo spat scowling.

“Liar” the brunette said with a haunted smile, calling on Shizuo’s bullshit and amused at tables turning. “You piss me off” he added for a good masseuse, but mirth died quickly.

Silence stretched between them with Izaya staring at a glass between his fingers and Shizuo staring at him. Izaya pushed himself and leaned forward to place the glass on a coffee table with a click. His face nearly side by side to Shizuo’s. The blond took a sniff and an expensive cologne and clean metal associated with the flea rushed into his nose. The flavor of the man. Something that Shizuo had told himself has been hated because of his inability of dealing with the man, with what came with him. Something that couldn’t be bend to Shizuo’s will, to shape and form like he wished for. Something that was pulling out the worst in him and with glee taking aimed hit at him without any complain. Something that Shizuo hated about himself and gave someone an amusement with it. The violence within him shouldn’t be cherished. Should be hated and put down. Yet Izaya could find it a trait that could be put to a challenge over and over again reaching for its limits.

“Sooo…” the brunette stretched the word. “You came here to finally get to know me at my last moments?” he asked with a huff of delight even if in a situation they’ve been put in, he shouldn’t.

“No, I came here to find a way to wake you up.”

“And how that game of twenty three questions could help me, hmm?” not hearing an answer he tried different approach. “And how I managed to wake YOU up?”

“I’m not sure. Everything is a bit fuzzy” he took a deep breath. “But you killed me. At least from what Shinra said you needed to do.”

Something shifted in Izaya’s eyes. Some kind of realization. Whatever was happening in that head Shzuo knew that would stay there. But maybe, just maybe he could remember what happened before he ended in this apartment.

“You piss me off” Izaya said crossing arms at his chest but now staring at the blonde with more sure crooked smile. 

“Stop fucking saying that!” Shizuo growled.

“But it’s true. You’re not helpful at all” he throw his arms to both sides letting them hang on a backrest of a sofa.

“For someone who has a death threat looming above their fucking head you’re way too cheerful. Do you have a death wish, flea?” Shizuo said with a scowl and a slowly popping vein on his temple.

“There you are!” he shouted out and leaned closer to Shizuo with interest staring at blonde’s face. Shizuo pulled back but still the distance was way too close for his liking. “The old Shizu-chan is finally with us” he added with a wide razor smile.

“Stop” Shizuo said standing up and while turned with his back to the brunette he took few deep breaths to calm himself down. He shuffled in his pocket to pick up a pack and reached for a lighter in his breast pocket. 

“Stop what?” he heard entertained informant from his seat.

“Stop doing that!” he turned with still unlit smoke between his fingers. “Why do you always do that!”

“Do what?” he purred with a glee hugging a back of a couch and staring at the blonde with what he could describe as seductive glance but if was not coming from Izaya.

“That” he wiggled his hand at all Izaya’s form rather than at a specific point. “That fucking thing you do!” Izaya crooked his head showing fake confusion. “You’re trying to piss me off on purpose! Why? Why you always make me angry?!” he shouted putting an end of the cigarette between his lips and chewing on it while trying to ignite a flame.

“If that is the heart to heart moment… “ he hummed looking at the debt collector fighting with a file wheel with a success. “It’s better to have any kind of reaction rather than nothing at all.”

Shizuo choked on a smoke that entered his windpipe too harshly with a sudden breath after hearing Izaya’s words. _That was it?!_ That was the reason for them not to stop their pointless fights? He wanted reaction from Shizuo, any kind of reaction? _Are you serious?_

“Are you serious?” he voiced his thought. “That’s why you kept fucking with me all this time?” he could feel a filter crushing under a pressure of his teeth so he pulled it out.

Izaya shrugged finding cuticles on his hands more interesting and picking at them. “Well it was you who tried to punch me first” he mumbled while reminding the blonde his past mistake.

“For fuck sa…” he covered his face feeling the filter of his smoke digging right under his eyes. He let his hands fall and pointed at the man in front of him. “YOU showed up out of fucking nowhere. After I had a fucking FIGHT. To do WHAT?” he growled dangerously. “To say fucking “hello”.”

“As a matter of fact, I was about to introduce myself but Shinra was quicker” he shrugged once again sitting straight at his seat. “But yes, that was the intention.”

“You fucking clapped, you fucker” he stomped closer with such a strength he was surprised that it didn’t make a whole in a floor.

“Well, I was impressed” he said still staring somewhere in a space in front of him.

“You were impressed?” he repeated. “You were fucking impressed?”

“I saw something no human could do, of course I was fucking impressed!” the smaller man shouted out with a glare and seeing Shizuo’s surprise at the curse he crossed his arms and turned to admiring whatever he spotted on the other side of the living room.

With a heavy sigh Shizuo moved and fall on a spot right beside Izaya on the couch. The man was still sitting still not acknowledging the blonde with what could be called a pout. Such a childish reaction made Shizuo huff with a short laugh but it died in his throat. He pulled a cigarette back to his lips taking a smoke into his lungs and letting it out loudly. He dived into memories from over a decade ago trying to remember everything from that day.

“After that truck” Shizuo said much more calmer. “When I was laying a whole day in bed after that, I realized that you were the first person I haven’t punched.”

“Should I be honored?” Izaya hissed not changing his position.

“Yeah, you should” he laughed shortly. “You were something else” he admitted staring at the cigarette he kept rolling between his fingers. He heard a shift at his side realizing he picked Izaya’s attention. “And that kept me angry. All the time” he plugged a smoke back into his mouth inhaling it. “And you kept pushing me to show that side of me I hated about myself” fumes escaping his lips with each word. “And each time you were victorious. I thought that after I’d finally catch you and gave you beating you deserved, you’d turned out to be like rest of them” he looked at Izaya seeing those sparkling eyes that in a day light reminded him of a river of blood he saw during his whole life after each fight.

“Like what?” he Izaya asked curiously.

“Afraid. Just not so special” he added for a good measure.

Izaya frowned lowering his gaze to Shizuo’s hands and smoldering cigarette. The blonde could see his brain running at the light speed. And Shizuo realized that was Izaya’s power. His quick mind that with a space and time still out of reach to most, he could predict what would about to happen. He could openly admire this now, it this weird reality where they’re stuck. To know the man that would probably turn into his old self right after waking up.

“You were special too” Izaya said quietly looking at brown eyes of Shizuo. “And I never lied to you. I never lied in my life.”

That was technically true. The man juggled facts or let a questions unanswered bearing the ugly truth in a least expected time, but he never lied. He used the truth like his knives. He used it as a weapon against others, to strike them with their own lies. He was a holder of every secret that needed sooner or later see a daylight.

“You called me an idiot” Shizuo accused with a frown.

Izaya laughed. “Because you are one!” he said with glee.

“Izaya” the blonde growled.

“But that’s true!” he added with mirth. “You tried to lie to me and all around you. You tried to turn into someone you’re NOT” he placed his small hand on Shizuo’s arm. “Don’t do that after you’ll leave this place” the debt collector glanced down to a light touch and right back at Izaya’s soft face.

“What about you? Will you still be the bastard I know?” he let out his own amusement.

At Shizuo’s words Izaya let go of his arm and stood up. He made his way to a window with a view on a neighbor building. The blonde could see pale hands on sides of his arms as if hugging himself. He could see his head turning from side to side admiring the landscape. Shizuo didn’t like this silence. He was always trusting his instincts and quite Izaya was an announcement of bad news. And only then Shizuo saw that far away buildings behind the glass of the window were slowly fading away like a smoke from his cigarette.

“I’m not sure if I can leave this place” he finally said and his words pierced Shizuo more painfuly than any of his knives. “If Shinra hasn’t found a way to bring me back and I’m still standing, so a killing me option is out of the question, I’m sure there is none” he voiced his fears with a voice so fragile that if not a stillness of their surrounds Shizuo was sure it would be lost. The blonde stood up himself, throwing his cigarette into a once again empty ashtray and made his way to a spot behind Izaya’s back. Over his head he observed the slowly decaying world. He couldn’t remember the same process in his dream. Was there a difference in their dreams.

“In your dream. I shot you” Izaya said as if reading his mind. “You passed quickly. Your world fell apart too” he shuddered at the memory. “But mine is dying slower.”

“We still have some time” Shizuo said with a rush.

“Shizuo…” Izaya stopped him with tiredness in his voice.

His name. His true name was there. Fell from those thin lips. And it pained him. His name at the moment like this filled with resignation. He shouldn’t hear it now. He preferred to not hear it at all. 

He took one more small step almost feeling a warmth of Izaya’s back on his chest, seeping through his white dress shirt and vest. He hang his head to a side of Izaya’s near his ear, with dark hair brushing his cheek. The victory of finally catching the man tasted bittersweet. Izaya had no chances from the start. Stuck in this isolated place with no way to run. And at last at Shizuo’s mercy. 

“Can I?” he whispered with his breath ruffling dark stands that ticked side of his face.

He more felt a nod than saw it, with tips of dark hair brushing his ear, with both their eyes stuck into the view. He moved his arms around thin shoulders, never they felt so heavy. He linked his fingers on his writs pressed to solar plexus right where Izaya’s heart was. And another strike came, he couldn’t feel beating of it under his hands. But he would not let this moment to pass into another wave of grieving. He placed his chin in a crook of Izaya’s neck looking ahead. The far end of the city was already covered in a thick fog.

“I will not say it” Izaya said quietly.

And Shizuo knew that he would never hear words he so desperately wanted to hear. He knew that Izaya would never say the words of deep devotion, a simple “I love you” would needed to be earned. And Shizuo wished to have more time to gain that trust and countless moments of experiencing the care from the brunette. But they would never have it. Shizuo had only this moment and it was already enough after years of misunderstanding from him and heavy walls on Izaya’s side. Walls that Shizuo would shutter if he had more time.

“I know” he whispered to the brunette’s ear.

“You should go” he could swear he have heard a treble in Izaya’s voice.

“Nah” he replied burying his chin more into a narrow space. “I’m comfortable here.”

“Well, I’m not” Izaya spite a bit louder.

“Liar” Shizuo huffed. “That’s the first time you lied to me” murmured.

“Yes” he nodded. “Yes, I did.”

The gray clouds moved down the street under Izaya’s building. The high stores disappearing into thin air right in front of their eyes. He tightened his hold around a thin body, slim from years of running away from him. He buried his face into Izaya’s neck but even with his lips near his pulse point he didn’t dare to brush it. He could feel Izaya pressing his back more into his chest.

“Ne, Shizu-chan” Izaya’s voice pulled him out of his head. He hummed and turned his face back to a window spotting half of the city already gone. “How do you think our first date would look like?”

Shizuo laughed. “It would be a fucking disaster” his answer amused the brunette that shook with laughter in his arms. “I would probably pick something boring like dinner or movie.”

“Who said you would be the one to pick a place?” Izaya teased placing palm of his hand on Shizuo’s already covered wrist. “I would have something more exciting to offer.”

“Like what?” he asked curiously trying to see Izaya’s face from behind his back but only spotting his profile.

“I’m not going to tell you, it’s a surprise.” 

When a nearby block started to vanish their own shook at its base. Izaya’s grip tightened. The view covered in gray color and a hum of sand smacking at glass of windows was deafening.

“Shizuo, please!” Izaya pleaded loudly trying to be heard over all the noise.

There, once again his name said wrongly. He pushed his face back, rushed his hands to Izaya’s shoulders and forced him to face him. He curled his fingers high on sides of Izaya’s neck with thumbs brushing his cheeks. His reddish eyes were not filled with tears but still reflected a deep despair. His own hands placed over Shizuo’s. In his final moments he didn’t want to admire a view but rather the face that finally showed something else than mocking grin. And Shizuo was selfish, because he was glad to see that expression on Izaya. Of hurt over their end, of Izaya thinking about him in their last moment. Of him constantly coming to him, even if Shizuo tried to prove him wrong and Izaya being a stubborn bastard trying to show him the same.

And he knew that what they could have, would not be healthy. This constant clash of theirs. But he would not have it any other way. Because Izaya wouldn’t bend to his will, he would never shape like metal under his fingers, he would stay tall at his side when trying to reach with his hand to tame him or stand in front of him to stop him like an indestructible god. He would take anything and everything that the other had to offer. _He always had and always will._ And he would give all of himself in return, all of it as the brunette wanted. Even the ugly side of what he despised in himself. He frowned with that always present determination in his eyes.

“I will say it!” he roared over the noise and Izaya’s eyes widened hearing his voice. “I lov…”

Both of them perished into a dust joining raging inferno consuming the apartment.


End file.
